@dan the Old Guy,
In the Marines, at my beloved Island, we spent 2 weeks on marksmanship. I have a Expert rating with a M16A2 service rifle using iron sights.
And that, IMHO, is what we need to be focusing on: Marksmanship.
New optics are great and have their place, but we need to emphasis the first round hit and not just from a high end sniper rifle, but the Main Battle Rifle.
Ditch the “assault” rifle. If the rifle and the round is good out to the 800 line, you know it is going to be good at 200.
Looking at the data, and real world application, a number of the 6.5s out does the 6.8 and wont leave the troops wanting.
I am a fan of the 7.62×51 but recognize the advantages of some of the 6.5s and if they would apply them from the basic rifleman to the squad automatic rifle to the general purpose MG, then the logistics get that much simpler.
The 5.56 performance was so poor, the Army had to spend a lot of money to produce the Enhanced Performance Round to over come all the short comings of the 62grn green tip 5.56.